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Charlton Heston
Charlton Heston (October 4th, 1924 - April 5th, 2008) is an American actor from Evanston, Illinois. He is widely recognized for his role as the Biblical character Moses in the 1956 Cecil B. DeMille epic, The Ten Commandments. Heston also achieved fame at the 1959 Academy Awards where he won the Best Actor nomination for his titular role in the William Wyler film, Ben Hur. Heston also made headway in the science fiction genre, typically playing protagonist characters in a post-Apocalyptic setting. In 1971, he played the role of Commander Robert Neville in the movie The Omega Man, and in 1973 he played Robert Thorn in the dystopic Richard Fleischer film, Soylent Green. Heston's most infamous science fiction role however, goes back to 1968 where he played the cynical anti-hero, George Taylor, in the Arthur P. Jacobs production, Planet of the Apes. In 1969, the studio heads at Twentieth Century-Fox wanted Heston to return as the starring role in Beneath the Planet of the Apes. Heston didn't want to commit to a sequel, but agreed to make a brief appearance so long as his character was killed off early in the film. After several script drafts, it was decided that the Taylor character would function as a framing sequence for the second film. He appeared briefly in the beginning of the movie, where he falls into the Mutant trap, and returns towards the end of the film for the movie's climax. Heston donated his salary from Beneath the Planet of the Apes to charity. The original storyline for Taylor was later adapted for the character of John Brent. Behind the Planet of the Apes ]] It was Heston's idea for his character to destroy the Earth at the end of ''Beneath the Planet of the Apes. Originally, the Taylor character was intended to defiantly detonate a Doomsday weapon, but the script was slightly altered so that Taylor instead set the bomb off accidentally. Heston believed that by destroying the entire planet, it would stave off future sequels. However, the Planet of the Apes franchise spawned three more films following Beneath the Planet of the Apes. Ibid Following his climactic demise in Beneath the Planet of the Apes, Charlton Heston pursued other film roles. He began to step away from leading roles and started doing voice work. Allegedly, the FBI asked him to be the voice of God in negotiations with David Koresh during the siege at Waco. In his later years Heston made a number of interesting cameo's, such as playing Arnold Schwarzenegger's boss in True Lies. In 2001 however, Heston found himself returning to the Planet of the Apes. Donning ape make-up for the first time, Charlton had a cameo appearance as Zaius the aging chimpanzee father to Tim Roth's Thade. The character "aped" one of Heston's closing lines from the original movie, this time condemning mankind with the words, "Damn them. Damn them all... to Hell!" In August of 2002, Charlton Heston publicly revealed that he was diagnosed with symptoms relating to Alzheimer's disease. On Saturday April 5th, 2008, Heston passed away. He was 83. Wikipedia Notes * Charlton Heston's birth name is John Charles Carter. Ironically, John Carter is also the name of a popular science fiction adventure hero created by writer Edgar Rice Burroughs in 1912. Like Heston's Taylor, John Carter was a military man who was mysteriously transplanted to an alien world where he fought up against strange, aggressive natives in an effort to rescue a local beauty.Burroughs, Edgar Rice, "A Princess of Mars", All-Story Magazine, 1912 * Planet of the Apes was Heston's first full-nude scene. Behind the Planet of the Apes * In a seventh season episode of The Simpsons entitled, "A Fish Called Selma", Homer Simpson provides a pastiche of Heston's character, Taylor, for a fictitious musical number called Stop The Planet Of The Apes, I Want To Get Off! A Fish Called Selma External Links * Charlton Heston profile at the Internet Movie Database (IMDB) * Charlton Heston profile from Hollywood.com * Charlton Heston profile at Celebopedia * Meredy's Charlton Heston Trivia Mania References Category:Actors Category:Male Production Crew Members Category:Complete Articles